Upon a Mystic Tide (30 page)

John rubbed little circles on her shoulder. “If it doesn’t make any difference, then why wonder about it?”

She half-shrugged. “I’m curious.” Her right hand captured beneath her pillow, she figured the only way she could
not
touch him with the left one would be to stuff it under her side. That didn’t work. Felt as if her arm was ripping from its socket. She frowned into the dim light. Now what? She couldn’t hold her arm midair for however long they lay here.

Good grief. What difference did it make? It was just a touch—and there certainly didn’t have to be anything sexual in it. His chest was just a comfortable place to rest her hand; no less, but certainly no more. And he didn’t appear to hold qualm one about touching her. Those little circles on her shoulder felt delicious. So why should she feel uncomfortable at touching him?

Giving in, she lowered her hand to his hair-roughened chest, over his heart. Bare skin? Lord help her, the robe gaped. Her stomach surged to her throat and her heart knocked against her ribs. Why, oh why, couldn’t his clothes be dry and he be in them?

“If I answer your question, then will you let me have my nap?”

“Yes.” His grumpy tone hadn’t fooled her. He just didn’t want to be asked questions he might not want to answer. “Back when we were together, why did you put Elise’s needs before mine?”

“I didn’t.” He sounded genuinely surprised.

“You did.” She forced the bitterness from her voice and rubbed a tiny square on his chest to apologize. “You left me alone over Christmas, Jonathan.”

He tilted up her face with a thumb under her chin. If it hadn’t been too dark, they’d have seen eye to eye. “I never put Elise’s needs before yours.
Never.
Your desires, maybe, but never your needs. And that Christmas was about Dixie as much as it was about Elise. And about me.”

What did that mean?

He paused a long moment, then dropped his voice. “You don’t understand, do you?”

Bess grunted, “Uh-uh.” She didn’t dare to risk words for fear he’d stop explaining.

“You’re strong and capable, Bess. One of the most independent women I’ve ever known. If you want something done, you do it or you have it done. I wasn’t worried about you being able to take care of yourself. You were safe and at home. Fine. And whatever might come up, I trusted you to handle it. You always had. But Elise was in a panic. All in the world she had was Dixie. Can’t you imagine a mother’s fear at not knowing if her daughter is dead or alive? Elise was falling apart at the seams, Doc. And then there was Dixie.” He let his hand sweep down the length of Bess’s hair. “She was just a kid. A scared kid who wasn’t safe at home but held captive. A kid in the hands of kidnapers who could have been doing only God knew what to her.”

Bess started to remind him that Dixie might well have been in the arms of her fiancé but knowing now that before he’d taken those comments as a lack of faith in his judgment, she held her tongue. “In
other words, Elise and Dixie needed you, and I didn’t. Is that what you thought?”

“Well, yes.” He cocked his head. The satiny pillowslip rustled. “I got a lead, Bess. I
had
to check it out. Not knowing what was happening to Dixie, I couldn’t ignore it until after the holiday. What kind of investigator would do that? What kind of man would do that? If your husband put something that important on hold, would you respect him?”

“I don’t know.” That honesty wasn’t very flattering. But she’d looked at this from a different perspective for years and weighing these new views would take a little time. She’d thought she’d analyzed to death the dynamics at work in their relationship, but now she had doubts. Had she looked at the big picture and not just her own version of it?

“Be honest with me. And with you.”

“I don’t think I would respect him much,” she finally decided.

John stopped his hand at her nape then worked his fingers up under her hair, against her skin. “What if the lead had panned out? What if I’d stayed home, pretending everything had been fine, ignoring Elise’s feelings and her fear for her daughter and, after Christmas, I’d gotten up to Portland and had found Dixie dead? I’d have to live with wondering if I’d done what I should have done. Wondering if I’d given just a little more, tried just a little harder, been just a little less selfish, I might have been able to save her.”

Steep, steep repercussions. Ones Bess, though ashamed to admit it, never had considered. Close to tears, she kept her eyes squeezed shut. “I understand.” She’d thought he hadn’t cared. Not true. He’d cared a great deal. For the child incapable of caring for herself, and for Bess. He’d trusted her to be capable of caring for herself
and
of understanding his what-if fears. She hadn’t. And only now did she see how unfair she’d been to him.

His words echoed through her mind:
I loved you, woman. What more did you need to understand?

He had loved her. In his way, he really had. But he’d been unfair to her, too. Three days of worry. Three long, fear-ridden days that had seemed to stretch on forever. He thought her strong. Capable. But she wasn’t. So many times, she’d wanted to lean on him. To reach out, to ask his opinion, his advice. But she’d been afraid to do it. What if he’d reacted the way her father had reacted? What if any display of weakness or dependence had repulsed Jonathan?

The truth struck her with the force of a sharp right hook. She’d been unfair, too. Jonathan was Jonathan. He wasn’t, nor would he ever be, like her father or anyone else. All men were not alike—how well she knew it. And how tragic that for all her training and experience she’d failed to see that simple truth in her own situation.

Her grandmother’s words about not being able to see the forest for the trees came to mind. Rubbing her fingertips, Bess mulled on the wrong she’d done. It was too late for it to matter, of course, but still, she’d like to know the truth. Standing outside the forest, no, she’d never see the trees. But if she ventured inside
 . . .

A few minutes slipped past. Maybe it
was
time
she found out how he’d react.

Finally, she worked up her courage. Her stomach churned and, though chilled, she broke out in a sweat. This was a monumental moment in her life, and she didn’t much care for monumental moments. By far, she preferred smooth personal sailing. “Jonathan?”

“Hmmm?”

Her throat went dry. “I needed you, too.”

His hand, sweeping her hair, stilled.

A long tense moment crept by. Then another. Her nerves stretched taut. Why didn’t he say something—
anything
to put her out of this misery? “I—I understand why you did what you did now. I should have seen that then, but I didn’t.” She stared at him in the semidarkness, grateful for its shielding cloak. Looking into his beautiful eyes, she’d never have the courage to say what she wanted to say. What rested deep in her heart. “I just wanted you to
 . . .
know.”

“Thank you, Bess.” His voice sounded husky soft, a tremor from cracking.

She had to admit to the rest, too. It was time. Lord, could she do it? She had to try. To at least try. “I’m not always
 . . .
strong, or capable, or self-sufficient. I try, but I don’t always succeed.”
Hard. So hard, this. “Sometimes I really needed you too, and I had to struggle to not burden you with my . . . challenges. Troubles. Worries. Concerns. Problems. Fears. I needed you! “I know you admire women who take care of themselves.”

He turned and his minty breath fanned her face. “I admire you. I always have. You needing me wouldn’t have been a burden, Doc. It’d have been a blessing.”

Cotton-mouthed, she swallowed, afraid to believe. “That’s what Tony said.”

“I agree with him—on that.” John paused, as if collecting his thoughts, then went on. “I never wanted you to feel you couldn’t talk to me about anything. I felt shut out. Unessential.” He cupped his hand over hers on his chest. “I wanted us to share everything.”

“No, you didn’t. We have to be brutally honest here, Jonathan. You might think you wanted to share everything but you truly only wanted to share some things. The comfortable ones. Otherwise your parents wouldn’t have been—or continue to be—a taboo subject.”

Against her forehead, his jaw went chisel hard. “Sorry, but I can’t talk about them.”

“Can’t or won’t?”

“Can’t.” He swallowed hard. “I—I want to. I just
 . . .
can’t.”

Disappointment ricocheted through her, rib to rib, heart to soul, and hope of them finally understanding each other, finally making genuine progress and settling their differences, died. Before, she’d shut him out. And he’d shut her out. Now, she was trying—Lord, but was she trying—to be open and honest, and still he shut her out. Just like before. She couldn’t make their relationship—might as well call a spade a spade, their marriage—work alone. He had to do his part, too. “Fine.”

“Fine.”

She turned over onto her side, her back to him, rested her head on his upper arm, then closed her eyes. Burying the anger, disappointment, and bitterness, as she’d buried everything else for most of her life, she stilled.

Nearly asleep, she missed his warmth. They’d come so close to harmony. She hated this emotional distance between them. Hated it. Maybe she could try again. Nothing ventured, nothing gained, right?

She licked at her lips, hoping she didn’t get her head bitten off for her trouble. “I hope your lead calls, Jonathan, and I hope you find Dixie. I really, really do.”

The covers rustled beneath them. He scooted closer, fitting himself to her spoon-fashion and pulling the end of the coverlet up over them. “Bess,” he whispered softly, then placed a kiss to the cove of her neck.

“Hmm?” Lord, but it felt good to be cradled in his arms. Cocoons might not be smart, but they sure were cozy.

“I have a confession to make.”

Had he thought it over and been repulsed by her confessing her weaknesses, after all? She snapped open her eyes and stared at the dim outline of the dresser, her heart nearly careening out of her chest. “Okay.”

“I hate that terracotta berry box you bought for Miss Hattie.”

“What?” Bess tried to rear but was thwarted. Tossing a leg over her thighs and an arm over her midriff, he held her firmly in place. She lay back down, her cheek pressed to his hair-roughened arm. It felt
 . . .
soothing. “Why?” The box? Why would he hate the box? She’d never expected this.

He hesitated a long moment, then answered. “Because you chose it.”

Her heart felt squeezed. “I chose you, too, Jonathan.”

“But that was then.” Sadness rippled through his voice and shimmied into her heart.

“Yes, that was then.” She shifted back, closer, trying to get off her sore hip, and to steal more of his heat.

He let out a little groan. “I’d, um, really appreciate it if you’d be still a minute.”

“Sorry.” His hard body swelled against her, sent heat swirling low in her belly. Statue-still, she stared sightlessly into the shadows, telling herself nine-hundred logical reasons why she shouldn’t turn over and make love with her husband. And she accepted each one of them as valuable and valid, as logical and wise. But one reason refused to balance out on logic’s pro and con scales. The magic.

It was still there.

And, Lord help them both, it was
so
strong.

Tired of fighting it, she shifted, preparing to turn.

John clasped a firm hand on her hip. “Unless you’ve thought this through and you’re sure, don’t turn over.” His voice low and gravelly, laced with warning. “I mean it, Doc.”

Her head ordered her to be still and not to move a muscle. Making love with him would be foolish. It’d negate their legal separation. They’d have to go through the entire divorce process all over again. This wasn’t a reunion. It was lust with a kick. That hadn’t been enough to hold him before, and she’d just end up losing him all over again. More mourning. More pain. More emptiness and struggling to build a life without him. Did she need that? Want that? No. Only a fool would, and she was no fool.